


Villanelle for Spike

by Anaross



Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-03
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-03-15 02:01:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3433616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anaross/pseuds/Anaross
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A companion villanelle for <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/3473528/chapters/7625318">My Life Closed Twice</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Villanelle for Spike

**Author's Note:**

> So here are the rules of the villanelle: "It is 19 lines long, but only uses two rhymes, while also repeating two lines throughout the poem. The first five stanzas are triplets, and the last stanza is a quatrain such that the rhyme scheme is as follows: "aba aba aba aba aba abaa." The tricky part is that the 1st and 3rd lines from the first stanza are alternately repeated such that the 1st line becomes the last line in the second stanza, and the 3rd line becomes the last line in the third stanza. The last two lines of the poem are lines 1 and 3 respectively, making a rhymed couplet."

**Villanelle for Spike**  
  
My life is losses, it's only right,  
It's what I've earned, not what I intend.  
But I choose the darkness every night.  
  
I live by gambling, and risk delight,  
I win more than I can ever spend;  
Still my life is losses, it's only right.  
  
I could die this instant, dust in light,  
Or live forever, and find no end.  
Yet I choose the darkness every night.  
  
I see ahead just another night--  
Never and more never don't transcend.  
My life is losses, it's only right.  
  
There is beauty, and love, in the light,  
But not for me, I cannot ascend.  
So I choose the darkness every night.  
  
I have thought two thoughts, and both despite:  
I'll not love again, nor take a friend.  
My life is losses, it's only right.  
And I choose the darkness every night.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published on LiveJournal in December 2005.
> 
> I was reading Sylvia Plath's [monster villanelle](http://www.geocities.com/emilylloyd.geo/plath.html) and wanted to try a Spike villanelle, just for fun. (Actually, I'm thinking of writing a Spuffy PWP-- Poetry without Plot, that is. :) It's very depressing, post-NFA, after Gunn has died and Illyria disappeared, and not very good. But see, the villanelle form is so hard, I can say, "Oh, it's really impossible to write one," and blame the form and not the poet.


End file.
